The main series note counting only stories that directly involve the Rangers or their direct allies; side-stories set elsewhere in the expanded universe, or taking place after the time when the Fall of the Shadow was set to occur, are not listed consists of:

I Wish... - prequel from the point of view of Alexandra Red Eagle, Tommy's birth mother.

Personality Conflicts - a series of disturbing dreams lead to a startling discovery for Tommy.

Fathers and Sons - Adam and his father are stranded on an alien world together. The problem: Adam's morphed, and Detective Park doesn't exactly like the Rangers.

Shadow Dancers - When the Shadow Empire attacks Aquitar and captures Billy, it's up to Tommy to save him.

Dying of the Light - The loss of the Gold Powers have an unexpected side effect: Jason's dying. Part one of a three-part arc.

Things Left Undone - Old friends return to Angel Grove after learning of Jason's condition. Meanwhile, a new Ranger arrives with unexpected ties to one of their enemies. Part two of a three-part arc.

Crystal's Shadow, Crystal's Light - As three new Zeo Rangers join the team and Prince Gasket returns to Earth, the Rangers may have a way to save Jason's life. Part three of a three-part arc.

Two of Hearts - While Rita kidnaps Kimberly and Skull for one of her evil plans, Zedd makes his own last stand against the Rangers.

Crystal Blue Persuasion - Rocky is sent to an alien world to help prevent the return of an ancient evil.

Revelations - Tommy is stunned when another truth about his family comes to light.

Dark Mirror One: Tiger, Tiger - Problems arise when two new Morphin Warriors begin tapping the Grid. Part one of a three-part arc.

Dark Mirror Two: Through a Glass Darkly - The Morphin Warriors face more trouble when a second Dark Reflection is created. Part two of a three-part arc.

Dark Mirror Three: Heart of Darkness - Rita's use of the Mirror of Night has unexpected consequences: the return of the monstrous Nyghtmyre. Part three of a three-part arc.

The More Things Change - When the space pirate Divatox comes to Earth, the Turbo Rangers are formed to stop her.

Who You Gonna Call? - Zack makes some interesting new friends in New York: the Ghostbusters!

Inner Demons - Rocky teams up with the Turbo Rangers to take down a literal demon from his past.

Worlds Enough and Time - Billy's having dreams of an alternate world, and an attempt to understand them leads to his switching places with his counterpart there.

Thicker than Water - Things get complicated when Jason's birth father comes to town, and even more so when Prince Gasket decides to take advantage of them.

Family Ties - Adam's not happy when his old enemy Scorpina comes looking for him.

The Green-eyed Monster - The Turbo Rangers and Tanya must work together to defeat the last of the Demons of Nyghtmyre.

Final Frontier - Dark Specter comes to Earth, leading to the Rangers' toughest battle yet. Fortunately, they've got new friends who can help out.

Blows So Red - Andros is trying to adjust to life on Earth, but Dark Specter isn't willing to let him have an easy time of it.

Second Star to the Right - Zordon is "arrested", and three Ranger teams head into space to find help. Meanwhile, the Turbo Rangers find themselves facing a deadly new threat. Part one of a six-part arc.

Straight on 'til Morning - As things escalate on both fronts, both sets of Rangers find themselves making new friends and enemies alike. Part two of a six-part arc.

Split Decision - Out in space, the Rangers split up in order to visit multiple planets at once. Meanwhile, the Turbo Rangers learn more about their new allies. Part three of a six-part arc.

Shadow Hearts - The teams in space arrive on four different worlds in search of allies, while Earth's defenders are faced with a shocking betrayal. Part four of a six-part arc.

The Waiting Game - Tommy and his team have the chance to strike a decisive victory against evil, while on Earth, an old friend of the Beetleborgs could turn the tide in the war against the Shadowborg. Part five of a six-part arc.

Though the Heavens Fall - As the time for Zordon's trial arrives, Earth's defenders prepare for their final battle against the Shadowborg and his allies. Part six of a six-part arc.

Aftermath - a nine-part miniseries, in which the various hero teams take time to stop and reflect after recent events.

Shadows of the Future - A temporal anomaly sends Rocky into a dark future, in which the Shadow Empire has conquered Earth.

Phantom Quest - The Phantom Ranger comes to Earth, and the last of Zordon's chosen comes home.

Mirror, Mirror - Dark Specter has a new plan... that involves an old and evil artifact.

Firebird Run - When a mysterious young woman comes to Earth, Tommy's younger brother Teddy gets a chance to be a hero.

Tropes featured in Personality Conflicts include:

Aborted Arc: For Want of a Nail was intended as an alternate universe to Personality Conflicts where Rito and Goldar never dropped the Zeo Crystal in the finale of MMPR. When the PC series went on protracted hiatus the "elseworlds" project got discarded.

A God Am I: Nyghtmayr was there. Shadowborg gets there in the original timeline.

All There in the Manual: Explaining the Morphin Grid, the differences between psychic energy and magic, and the shout outs, as well as her views on characterization of superhero teams.

A LOT of the backstory used in the series, including the unseen events between Good as Gold and the self-titled debut fanfic, originates in Ellen's earlier fanfics with Jen Bigley. These stories themselves are Broad Strokes versions of how Ellen later came to envision PC's backstory.

Turbo Heroes is the PC continuity adaptation of Super Sentai. Ellen has written extensive notes on the shows it adapts and the storylines of the series online.

Artistic License – Biology: Gasket tells his mother after killing King Mondo and usurping control of the Machine Empire for himself that his father-in-law King Aradon is always looking for new robot concubines.

Ellen has a great enthusiasm for kid-heroes, which crops up more and more throughout PC's expanded universe. Aside from the (canon) Beetleborgs and (sort-of canon) PC Turbo Rangers, the Yu-Gi-Oh!, Danny Phantom, and Detective Conan casts all play enormous roles in their respective corners of the universe.

Ellen loves to place strong women in situations where they can prove their own strength against a somewhat misogynistic regime. See No Woman's Land below.

Benign non-crossovers using analogous versions of alternate universe characters leads to Duke L'orange's counterpart The Black Falcon among dozens of other lawyer-friendly cameos. Ellen seems to enjoy non-crossover Mythology Gags at least as much as she does crossovers.

Clark Lane and Lois Kent seem to hover between a Name Sake Gag and Ellen's usual Lawyer-Friendly Cameo tendency. They mostly just exist to make Parker O'Neil's own reporter-gag name less ridiculous by extension.

Badass Family: To some extent the Scotts, to a greater extent the Olivers, and most of all the Parks. Lampshaded in Family Ties with Fred Kelman asking Franklin if anyone in his family is NOT a G.I. Joe.

Becoming the Mask: Larry Zedden was merely a means for Zedd to sow his wild oats in a human identity, much as Master Vile had done across several galaxies while his daughter and sole viable heir was trapped in a dumpster. Unfortunately, this particular identity and his proximity to Earth made that persona take root.

Rita genuinely fell in love with Lord Zedd after years in a sham marriage and still mourns the "death" of her husband when he resumed his identity as Larry.

Somewhat true for Zedd himself, being as the original identity of Prince Zedd the Zarakin royal is who both Zedd and Larry think of themselves "as," despite the former being the result of a magic spell and the latter the result of Earth's leylines messing with his brain.

The Beard: Jason's parents pretended to be in love so that Jason's grandparents wouldn't know that Jason's real father was Korean. Surprisingly, it worked.

Big Eater: Rocky, TJ and Zhane all have their moments. Apparently, it runs in the family for Rocky and TJ. And that's leaving aside the fact that Ranger status increases the metabolism and burns a lot more calories than usual.

Broad Strokes: The televised events of the first four years and the general contents of the first six years of Power Rangers happened. Any larger mythology or backstory is relegated to the dustbin as Ellen constructs a new backstory for her own universe to incorporate multiple other franchises into a stable timeline.

Ashley and TJ have different full names than their series counterparts, and Katherine's name is spelled Hilliard instead of Hillard.

"Eltare" as well.

VR Troopers is moved in continuity from 1994-1995 when it aired to 1997-1998 when the fic's contemporary era is located.

The United Alliance of Evil appears to function as a sort of hybrid military alliance and Weird Trade Union in practice. They even seem to have their own evil Obstructive Code of Conduct on recruiting planetary villains.

PC does a surprisingly good job backing into continuity with the series. The United Alliance of Evil is not mentioned by name until Dark Specter shows up. The Intergalactice Police Force was used in Personality Conflicts prior to the Power Rangers Turbo writers picking the same name for the Blue Senturion's agency.

Fred Kelman and Justin Stewart on the same team also comes to mind.

A LOT of other fanfic writers use Lita and her Spear Counterpart Cade as stock psychologists for their stories.

Cerebus Rollercoaster: The series maintains a rather consistent dark tone up through The More Things Change, at which point it becomes a more fun-loving series of adventures. It snaps back to dramatic with the arrival of Dark Specter.

Chekhov's Boomerang: It probably would have been a good idea to dig up all those shards left behind after the Mirror of Night exploded.

The Tire Shield is actually good for something!

Remember the Sword of Power? The show didn't.

The Chick: Averted and Lampshaded. Ellen dislikes passive female characters and will go out of her way to use stronger women instead. The only canon female hero to retain any trace of timidity is Katherine, who has never had a focal of her own. The version of David in Personality Conflicts comes much closer to being The Chick than any of the girls.

Subverted with Jen Bigley's OC Christina, who has no real personality to speak of and almost no lines over the entire run of the series. Though supposedly a genius in her own right, her job is pretty much "Billy's girlfriend."

Evil Virtues: Gasket and Archerina are truly in love. Similarly, Gasket feels the Alliance of Evil has drifted away from its espoused beliefs and become Dark Specter's gang of petty thugs. This leads to their Honor Among Thieves alliance with Rita.

Expanded Universe: Many of Ellen's Danny Phantom stories (starting with Danny Shadow) are set in the PC universe circa 2004. Other than Lita publishing a book on metahuman psychology, Ellen makes a point to reveal very little about what happened to the characters.

Face–Heel Turn: Drew, though it's ultimately reversed. Also, Prince Zedd was forcibly turned evil way back when, using the same spell Rita would eventually use on Tommy when she first recruited him to be her Green Ranger. Zedd eventually gets better.

Fantastic Racism: Most aliens don't like humans. Eltareans also don't like Zarakin.

The Federation: The Council of Worlds. Also doubling as a somewhat Obstructive Bureaucrat, they have managed to prevent the local group of galaxies from erupting in full out civil war by maintaining a state of quasi-détente with the Alliance of Evil. The entire convoluted Ranger team vs. villain army setup is bureaucratically mandated to bypass the Intergalactic Police Force ever directly engaging in military conflict with the Alliance and setting off a war.

Full-Name Ultimatum: Eileen Park (Adam and Franklin's mother) uses her youngest son's full name when she reveals to him that she knows both he and Adam are Rangers.

Generation Xerox: The Beetleborgs are rather explicitly held up as younger analogues to the VR Troopers (unsurprising given their show origins). As Drew and Jo are siblings, Kaitlin and Ryan's quasi-relationship is moved to Jo and Josh.

Good All Along: Finster joined Rita's services after she threatened his family. After she had them killed anyway, he stayed with her in order to sabotage her plans from within, purposely creating weak monsters for her. He eventually commits the ultimate sabotage, leading to Zedd's abandonment of Rita and subsequent return to the side of good.

Drew seems to teeter on the cusp of it, which Shadowborg takes full advantage of.

The Heartless: Happens a lot with the Shadow Empire, Nyghtmayr, Shadowborg, etc. The Shadow Empire was a failed attempt by a sorcerer to conjure forth Nyghtmayr and his Minor Demons from the Morpheus dimension without the Mirror of Night. The new form of Shadowborg was an attempt by Les Fortunes to recreate the original with powers he'd seen Nyghtmayr use, so they all do share a common origin.

Heel–Face Turn: Zedd, of all people! (Granted, it happens in canon, but still...) Also, Tommy and Jamie's evil clones.

Heroic R.R.O.D.: Remember how Jason could die if he used the Gold Ranger powers for too long?

Heroic Sacrifice: Subverted in the case of Tommy and Jamie's clones, played straight in the case of Katie/Kaitlin 2.

Hour of Power: Chris's powers, like Zhane's in canon. This also means he doesn't have to wear solid colors like the other rangers, and as such can wear a Robotech shirt.

Human Shield: Gasket pulls this with a weakened Jason in Crystal's Shadow, Crystal's Light. Played with, a bit: Jamie immediately pulls the "you kill him, I'll kill you" threat out, but Gasket shrugs it off. He's not there to kill Jason directly, he wants Jamie and Jason to play along and this is the best way to ensure that. However, Gasket makes it clear that his hatred for Jason is so strong that if killing Jason were his goal, or if Jamie doesn't cooperate, Gasket "would gladly run the very real risk of losing a swordfight to" Jamie for the satisfaction of seeing Jason dead.

I Know Mortal Kombat: Chris's time on flight simulators. Unfortunately, because they never covered docking maneuvers at the arcade, landing is not one of his specialties.

Intercontinuity Crossover: With MMPR:TM continuity. The sole instance in Personality Conflicts where an alternate universe element is treated as being from an alternate universe.

Not that it's any surprise to learn the real PC universe has a Dulcea who served in the Order of the Meledan as well.

Insistent Terminology: Worlds Enough and Time has an Insistent Terminology regarding the titles of the Power Rangers, but Ellen's use of Zyuranger inspired (animal)-Ranger names instead of (color)-Ranger names in the actual story fluctuates so much it's impossible to tell if Billy is just being punked because he's from another universe.

The actual show be damned, in this universe they're the Astro Rangers.

Light Is Not Good / Dark Is Not Evil: Lilian's power is the quasi-sentient "shadow" cast by the purity of the unified Zeo Crystal. It was channeled into a relatively noble host to ensure a power equal to nine other Zeo Rangers (including TREY) never ended up in evil hands. Since this is a universe with canonical Badass Decay, she's not especially worse than any of the other Zeo Rangers.

Loads and Loads of Characters: And loads. And loads. The total includes four full Ranger teams, two other teams and a solo warrior in nearby towns, the Ghostbusters in New York, and all the support staff, family members in the know, and other allies. Dark Specter even lampshades it when he's told there are now twenty-eight powered Rangers, commenting that "Counting the support staff would give me a headache."

Love Redeems: Not so much "redeems" in this case as "makes you stop being the Buttmonkey," but Kim and Skull meet the criteria. Any illusion Bulk and Skull were just the comic relief is washed away once Skull gets his dream girl and is elevated to Sixth Ranger status.

The love of Tyler and Terry (the first two Dark Reflections) for one another is a big factor in their redemption. It's indicated that Jade Thompson, Ashley's Dark Reflection, is headed this way because of her feelings for Chris.

Magic A Is Magic A: The way the Grid actually works in the stories is half-defined hokum, but it's relatively consistent with itself and with Ellen's production materials.

Ellen treats the act of creation and rebirth within Beetleborgs with more care than the original show ever did. Les can recreate Shadowborg because he was originally built in the real world and not internal to Beetleborgs comics. Art, however, cannot recreate the deceased Astral Borgs since he co-created them with his brother and only the two together could "remake" the ideas needed to resurrect them.

Flabber can't summon new things as often as Vexor or Nukus because most of his energy is being put into maintaining the gear that's already been summoned.

Magical Native American: Sorta. Tommy's magical, but not due to that half of his heritage. David, who invokes this trope in canon, has no magical power to speak of.

David's adopted father Sam Trueheart is (as in series continuity) an enormous example of generic shaman abilities.

The Mole / Feed the Mole: A weirdly benevolent version. Daystar is assigned to Earth by the Council of Worlds and IGPF to report back on the activities of Zordon and the Terran Power Rangers and ensure they never violate the interdict in place. She's already conspiring with them by the time she gets back to the planet.

Morality Pet: Astronema seems to be the only thing keeping Ecliptor from sinking into the abyss of madness that consumed Dark Specter and Darkonda.

More Dakka: 6 active Morphin Warriors ( 8 counting Peter and Tyler, 7 if you accept Billy's powers have been boosted since becoming a Ninjetti), 10 Zeo Rangers, 5 Turbo Rangers, 6 Astro Rangers, and one Phantom Ranger protect the Earth. Factor in the other two superhero teams on the planet and a Masked Rider and PC's Earth could rival most major comics universes for raw fighting capacity.

Factor in Teddy and Parker's enchanted swords, Lita's augmented strength from the (inert) Dragon Coin, Chelsea's assassin training, Daystar's IGPF expertise, a Blue Senturion unit from the future, and the unlicensed nuclear accelerators strapped to the backs of the Ghostbusters and the supporting cast makes them even more formidable.

Motive Decay: Explicitly stated by Dark Specter to be canon in this timeline. As the center of their local multiverse, Earth is bombarded with natural magic and renders villains either incompetent or forces them to Heel–Face Turn out of guilt.

In his scant appearances Count Dregon appears to have simply given up any effort to hold Edenoi or acquire the Masked Rider powers for himself. He is just tired and wants Dex dead.

Oedipus Complex: Tommy kills Vile. Much later, Prince Gasket murders his father King Mondo, even destroying his personality component to ensure he stays dead, in order to take control of the Machine Empire.

Precedent Excuse: Ferin, one of Trey's advisors, is rather stuck on doing things in the way they've always been, but when he objects to Trey's choice of his younger triplet sister Trialia as his successor (since she would become both the planet's ruler and Gold Ranger), one of the other advisors points out that there is a precedent - Queen Solaria, who held both the crown and the powers a very long time ago. By the time the meeting is done, four of the five advisors are supporting him whole-heartedly, and the fifth (who isn't fond of change, including women's increasing rights on the planet) reluctantly accepts as well.

Psychic Link: Josh and Shadowborg's connection snaps back into place the moment the latter is recreated. Chris and Zhane have one due to sharing a single set of powers simultaneously.

Interestingly, Twin Telepathy is mostly avoided with the Dark Reflections and Katie Starr. Knowing how someone thinks because you have their memories and knowing what they think because you're in their head are still treated as two separate things.

The Neji Rangers are explicitly named for the original Psycho Rangers from Megaranger.

Retcon: In the series, Billy absorbed "negative proton molecules" during the Command Center's explosion at the end of the original series and start of Zeo, which repelled the Gold Zeo power when he tried to take it in the episode Revelations of Gold. In Fathers and Sons, it's explained that Billy made at least that first part up: his body did repel the powers, but it was because of his accelerated aging (a side effect of the device he'd used to restore his original age after time was reversed at the end of the original series), which had not been discovered yet, and would eventually result in his moving to Aquitar during the Rangers of Two Worlds two-parter.

Sixth Ranger: Despite being filled with teams of fanfic-original characters, only Skull and Aisha are really treated like it with their respective groups. The former as Tommy is permanently lumped into the Zeo Rangers and can't fulfill his original duties with the Morphin Warriors. The latter as the Sixth Ranger of the GHOSTBUSTERS.

Inverted on the Ghostbusters side as well; Peter Venkman has Ranger powers of his own he never wants to use and only busts out in dire emergency in the classic sixth member tradition.

Josh Baldwin, the former White Blaster Beetleborg, returns to this role after Art Fortunes designs him a new set of powers.

Sixth Ranger Traitor: As soon as he's arrested, Trey figures out there is one in his line of succession.

Tangled Family Tree: Well, Tommy has a long-lost twin brother in canon. Now we learn his clone is his adoptive family's ancestor. And Master Vile is his father, making Rita and Rito his half-siblings.

The Unreveal: Ernie always knew the original teens were the Power Rangers.

So did most of their parents.

The Unseen: A rare non-character version. There is an entire year of continuity separating the finale of Power Rangers Zeo and the first Personality Conflicts story. During this time period the newly re-ascendant Rita and Zedd resume their attacks on Earth while the two factions of the Machine Empire continue theirs. While characters allude to some plots and a handful of characters from this period, it is never explored in any detail. See All There in the Manual above.

Uncanny Family Resemblance: Lita Kino is Makoto Kino's cousin. The age difference aside, she's described as pretty much identical looking.

And yet Ashley gets the Senshi-derived secondary powers.

Tyler and Terry are given glamors specifically to avoid having this problem when living adjacent to Tommy and Jamie.

Wizards and Witches: Magic-users (generally referred to as mages) can tap the power of the Morphin Grid, and are typically categorized by methodology. Members of each group can be of either gender. These include:

Witches, such as the long-dead Arigor, Rita Repulsa and her mother, draw their power from objects into which magic has been infused.

Sorcerers, such as Lord Zedd and Master Vile, draw their power from an alternate form in which they can tap the Morphin Grid.

Warlocks, such as Ciaran, focus their power primarily through incantations, including those contained in spellbooks.

Wizards, such as Zordon and Tommy, focus their power primarily through mental disciplines.

Community

Tropes HQ

TVTropes is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available from thestaff@tvtropes.org. Privacy Policy